"You must have a name," cried Mrs. Chalmers; "all the world need not know what we know. People will think you are a ward or protégée of mine; but you must have a name."
"Let her take ours, mother," suggested her son. But Hyacinth's face flushed.
"That would hardly do," said Mrs. Chalmers. "I will give you mine, my dear—the name that was mine in my girlhood—people used to think it a pretty one—Millicent Holte."
[CHAPTER XXV.]
"Millicent Holte—that is the name you must assume," said Mrs. Chalmers to Hyacinth; "and, though I never was so pretty or so sweet as you are, still I was a very happy girl—and I do not like to see a young life blighted. Kiss me, Millicent; you shall be like a daughter to me."
"I do not remember my own mother," observed the girl, simply, laying her fair head on the kindly breast, "and I thank Heaven for sending me to you."
"Before we finish this subject at once and forever," said the doctor, "let me ask you, Millicent, is there anything that I can do for you in connection with your secret? If so, speak to me just as freely as though I were your brother, and command me as you will."
"You can do nothing," she answered, mournfully. "I should not have given up but that I knew all hope was past, nothing can undo what has been done—nothing can remove, nothing lighten its shadow."